PG Knicks/Lakers

[DaGawd]

I'm still mad as hell we lost to these douchebags. Anyway, its another learning situation on the way to a greatly improved team. Prayers up for JB. Believe it or not the team is still gelling; Mikal probably shouldn't be starting and Mitch is still rounding into form. I still think this team has the potential to make it to the ECF. Patience! We haven't reached our ceiling.

there’s what 20 games left? if the gelling isn’t beginning to happen by now.. it never will

[3toheadmelo]

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[Lord Commander]

I'm still mad as hell we lost to these douchebags. Anyway, its another learning situation on the way to a greatly improved team. Prayers up for JB. Believe it or not the team is still gelling; Mikal probably shouldn't be starting and Mitch is still rounding into form. I still think this team has the potential to make it to the ECF. Patience! We haven't reached our ceiling.

there’s what 20 games left? if the gelling isn’t beginning to happen by now.. it never will

Sometimes it takes longer than one season (see Cavs) especially when injuries are a factor.

[3toheadmelo]

I'm still mad as hell we lost to these douchebags. Anyway, its another learning situation on the way to a greatly improved team. Prayers up for JB. Believe it or not the team is still gelling; Mikal probably shouldn't be starting and Mitch is still rounding into form. I still think this team has the potential to make it to the ECF. Patience! We haven't reached our ceiling.

there’s what 20 games left? if the gelling isn’t beginning to happen by now.. it never will

Sometimes it takes longer than one season (see Cavs) especially when injuries are a factor.

The Cavs have 3 very good defenders in their starting lineup though. We literally only have one, OG. Knicks need to get upgrades this summer. Hart, KAT, Brunson are all below average defenders. Mikal is average at best.

[TheGreenArrow]

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[Chanel Bomber]

We even had a chance to get Donovan Mitchell without giving up Randle, Mitchell Robinson and IQ. Never forget. Now Brunson has no help.

Losing out on Mitchell was blunder #1.

Trading for Mikal was blunder #2.

It baffles me how some of our friends here overthink this.

Mitchell is a borderline MVP candidate who's playing with another small guard and leading the Cavs to the best record in the NBA. Supposedly the Cavs beat our best offer yet the trade would've been destructive for us but not for them? The Grimes package with RJ and 3 firsts was more than fair - if not a bargain - for a player of his caliber.

Meanwhile, Mikal has never been an All-Star, the impact metrics don't particularly fancy him that much, and his defense regressed the season before the Knicks acquired him. And trading 3 unprotected firsts and an unprotected pick swap and a protected first to our crosstown rival for him is reasonable?

I swear it feels like I'm in the twighlight zone at times.

funny thing is people were celebrating not “overpaying” with that Mitchell package because he allegedly isn’t an A list superstar and hasn’t won a championship like Giannis, therefore we are too good for him. Then we turn around and trade a superstar package for Mikal who isn’t A list or B list or really any list of star, and this is defended. I could even be fine with that hypocrisy if he was a good role player glue guy or defender that puts us over the top, like OG seems to be. But he struggles even to be that at times. Most the time he barely makes an impact. Oh and the best part is now we can’t get Giannis either

Not getting Mitchell was bad, maybe not the end all be all because at least we kept the assets and pick package and there was still a window of opportunity to use them for something else really good. But in the end, we didn’t do that. We traded it all for a 3rd rate role player with a 4th rate impact

Yes I agree. I wanted to add that - although a missed opportunity - #1 was at least defensible to some extent (the reservations weren't baseless), and not destructive. #2 depleted our asset base with very little return on investment.

[kNicksGmen]

i went to bed at half time - watched the highlights this morning without being spoiled of the result.

brutal loss. i just kept looking at the score and it was staying up around 10 pretty late into the 4th... then it just kept getting picked away at and before you know it, game was tied. i obviously didn't see the whole game but many of the lakers big 3s in the 4th were after offensive rebounds or bobbled plays - felt unlucky.

then what the hell was that play call to end the 4th? there was PLENTY of time to get a good look and instead hart basically gets a grenade and doesn't even get a shot off.

looking at the box score - 15 points in the 4th. a true miracle they didn't blow it and lose in regulation - which would have saved brunson from the injury.

knicks are -3 net rating in the 4th quarter this season. far too often they score 25-30 points per quarter the 1st 3 then crap the bed in the fourth.

this would have been a really feel good win. instead it's falls far to the other spectrum due to brunson's injury.

[3toheadmelo]

Against OKC, Boston, Cavs, Lakers, KAT has averaged 16 PPG with a +\- of -11.0. He gets exposed against the top contending teams.

[Chanel Bomber]

We even had a chance to get Donovan Mitchell without giving up Randle, Mitchell Robinson and IQ. Never forget. Now Brunson has no help.

Losing out on Mitchell was blunder #1.

Trading for Mikal was blunder #2.

It baffles me how some of our friends here overthink this.

Mitchell is a borderline MVP candidate who's playing with another small guard and leading the Cavs to the best record in the NBA. Supposedly the Cavs beat our best offer yet the trade would've been destructive for us but not for them? The Grimes package with RJ and 3 firsts was more than fair - if not a bargain - for a player of his caliber.

Meanwhile, Mikal has never been an All-Star, the impact metrics don't particularly fancy him that much, and his defense regressed the season before the Knicks acquired him. And trading 3 unprotected firsts and an unprotected pick swap and a protected first to our crosstown rival for him is reasonable?

I swear it feels like I'm in the twighlight zone at times.

Bridges will be the role player we’ve been looking for soon enough. I cannot understand everybody’s impatience with this roster. Bridges has a long history of being an absolute two-way force. Her, his role and usage are diminished. Let things fall into place. He isn’t even as bad as you all claim after looking at the boxscores. There s still aren’t many players in the league I’d rather put on Steph Curry, maybe nobody.

I don't think Mikal has any history of being a "two-way force".

He was a 3&D role player in Phoenix, their 4th option in their run to the Finals behind Book, CP3 and Ayton.

His role expanded in Brooklyn and he had a few good months when he got there but his game regressed to the mean and fell back down to Earth last season, his ppg even falling below 20.0 despite the Nets' overall lack of talent.

Worse, his 3-point shot and his defense declined significantly.

I don't think he's bad at all. He's an above-average role player who does nothing remarkably well. His best asset now is his switchability but I don't think it's even translating into meaningful defensive impact.

There's nothing forceful about his game or his impact on the court imo.

Like Cohen said on KFS, he's fine but you don't trade your entire draft capital for "fine".

[TKKnicks1]

and i know it's all thibs fault as usual, not that he's without fault, but if you think that this roster with another coach can get 4 wins against the cavs, 4 wins against celtics and 4 wins against whoever comes out of the west you're kidding yourself. you'll be lucky if you can just accomplish the 1st one.

Like I said in another post, I don’t mind getting an upgrade over Thibs. But this roster ain’t it, no matter who the coach is.

I'm not convinced of this. I really think a modern day HC that actually has some sense of running an offense will bring out the best in this team. All through the summer after we acquired KAT we heard about how lethal the top of the key PnR would be with JB/KAT and we never see it. Our PnRs are only used to switch defenders and rarely do we actually get a pass out of them.

Thibs was ISO heavy and continues to be. There is no reason why the ball should be sticking to JB as much as it does when you have KAT/Mikal/OG as your 2nd, 3rd and 4th option. But how many times do we actually see some plays designed for our 2nd, 3rd and 4th option?

This team is winning on pure talent with high BBIQ players with great passing skills and instincts. Thibs doesn't know how to utilize the strengths of his players by setting up plays for them that will lead to success, this further shows in his inability to get anything productive out of his bench who aren't as high BBIQ and lack the instincts the starters do. The one thing Thibs does do well is instill confidence in his starters and that's why they play their a$$ off for him. Get a coach in here that not only instills confidence but instills some sort of game plan that sets everyone up to utilize their strengths and I assure you it will bring out the beast in this roster.

[kNicksGmen]

Against OKC, Boston, Cavs, Lakers, KAT has averaged 16 PPG with a +\- of -11.0. He gets exposed against the top contending teams.

post the +\- of everyone in those games.

-11 doesn't seem bad considering we normally lose those games by 20

[prophet_of_rage]

0-8 against top 3 teams in both conferences and you’re talking about allowing things to grow. Delusional as hell

That mskes sense. Our quick change left us unready for this level.

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I don’t exactly understand what you want to say, but it sure can’t be denied that this team has tons of room to grow and it is a very real possibility that they’ll realize their two-way potential sooner than later.

Easy. We changed the roster significantly and assumed that there would be no growing pains. We aren't ready yet. We need continuity to grow.

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[3toheadmelo]

Against OKC, Boston, Cavs, Lakers, KAT has averaged 16 PPG with a +\- of -11.0. He gets exposed against the top contending teams.

post the +\- of everyone in those games.

-11 doesn't seem bad considering we normally lose those games by 20

You can find them on nba.com.

Brunson is averaging 25.8 PPG against those teams while KAT is shtting the bed averaging just 16 PPG. Mikal is also only averaging 13 PPG against those teams. The two guys we went all in on disappear against the best teams in the league. And yall wonder why we’re mid.

[robillionaire]

Losing out on Mitchell was blunder #1.

Trading for Mikal was blunder #2.

It baffles me how some of our friends here overthink this.

Mitchell is a borderline MVP candidate who's playing with another small guard and leading the Cavs to the best record in the NBA. Supposedly the Cavs beat our best offer yet the trade would've been destructive for us but not for them? The Grimes package with RJ and 3 firsts was more than fair - if not a bargain - for a player of his caliber.

Meanwhile, Mikal has never been an All-Star, the impact metrics don't particularly fancy him that much, and his defense regressed the season before the Knicks acquired him. And trading 3 unprotected firsts and an unprotected pick swap and a protected first to our crosstown rival for him is reasonable?

I swear it feels like I'm in the twighlight zone at times.

funny thing is people were celebrating not “overpaying” with that Mitchell package because he allegedly isn’t an A list superstar and hasn’t won a championship like Giannis, therefore we are too good for him. Then we turn around and trade a superstar package for Mikal who isn’t A list or B list or really any list of star, and this is defended. I could even be fine with that hypocrisy if he was a good role player glue guy or defender that puts us over the top, like OG seems to be. But he struggles even to be that at times. Most the time he barely makes an impact. Oh and the best part is now we can’t get Giannis either

Not getting Mitchell was bad, maybe not the end all be all because at least we kept the assets and pick package and there was still a window of opportunity to use them for something else really good. But in the end, we didn’t do that. We traded it all for a 3rd rate role player with a 4th rate impact

i agree with your take but the difference was at the time of the mitchell trade the knicks weren't even considered anything close to contending. brunson was still an unknown and not expected to be a star. at the time of the bridges trade there was the combination of the assets losing value and knicks approaching being locked into the roster due to apron restrictions. and fans/people felt the january knicks that were dominant basically just adding bridges would be contenders. the expectation of losing i-hart also forced their hand imo

i'm not defending the trade and like i said i agree in hindsight trading for mitchell was the better move - but the context of where the team was in their timeline was different.

also i am sure if the knicks did trade for mitchell, fans would have defended it as not being an overpay. fans are largely homers at the end of the day so will defend the move the team makes or downplay the move they didn't make etc.

I don’t really accept this first excuse because it’s just admitting that whoever was doing this “considering” of the Knicks not being able to compete, front office or fans or otherwise, and therefore deciding it’s pointless to add Donovan, did not have the foresight to recognize the talent level we had on the team. So if that’s their rationale, we didn’t realize we were sitting on a second round caliber playoff team, well that’s another piece of the blunder puzzle

the Cavs happily did the trade even though they didn’t even make the playoffs. Donovan really and truly is an A list star and the proof is in the pudding. Apparently the move was supposed to ruin them and they have the best record in the NBA.

Your last paragraph is probably true

[mpharris36]

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just a reminder we continue to run a majority of drop coverage...

[robillionaire]

Against OKC, Boston, Cavs, Lakers, KAT has averaged 16 PPG with a +\- of -11.0. He gets exposed against the top contending teams.

post the +\- of everyone in those games.

-11 doesn't seem bad considering we normally lose those games by 20

And he was the only positive plus minus of the starters last night

[louisorr]

Kat giving me Charles Smith / Kieth Van Horn vibes.

Soft.

....and fire Thibs, like, today.

Clear as day yo

and replace with who? is not a valid question.

It's a goddarn NBA front office.

have a plan!

[Jalen Bluntson]

Lose the lead and lose Brunson. Then we lose the game. What a perfect storm of shyt that game was. I'm done with Thibs. You can all pick apart the roster all you want. The HC is the weak link here. Not Bridges. Not Hart. Not the bench. It's the HC.

[kNicksGmen]

Against OKC, Boston, Cavs, Lakers, KAT has averaged 16 PPG with a +\- of -11.0. He gets exposed against the top contending teams.

post the +\- of everyone in those games.

-11 doesn't seem bad considering we normally lose those games by 20

You can find them on nba.com.

Brunson is averaging 25.8 PPG against those teams while KAT is shtting the bed averaging just 16 PPG. Mikal is also only averaging 13 PPG against those teams. The two guys we went all in on disappear against the best teams in the league. And yall wonder why we’re mid.

how many shots is Kat getting? the offense is "give brunson the ball" of course he's averaging more.

what is JB's +/-? you did the work for Kat, do it for brunson.

last night Kat was -1 and brunson was -8. doesn't exactly fit your narrative.

in those 8 games brunson is -111 (avg -13.9)

Here's the starting 5:
Brunson -111
Kat -98
OG -67 (missed 1 game)
Bridges -145
Hart -125 (missed 1 game)

[3toheadmelo]

Against OKC, Boston, Cavs, Lakers, KAT has averaged 16 PPG with a +\- of -11.0. He gets exposed against the top contending teams.

post the +\- of everyone in those games.

-11 doesn't seem bad considering we normally lose those games by 20

And he was the only positive plus minus of the starters last night

KAT had 12 points last night 3-13